Gold panning is traditionally carried out by hand using a pan into which a slurry of water, stones and sand are introduced and a motion imparted by hand to the pan with the aim of separating gold particles from the slurry. A similar process may be used for separating gem stones from such a slurry. This procedure is obviously tedious and time consuming and thus some mechanical apparatus have be proposed to simplify the above process. The known panning apparatus however, are sometimes difficult to operate, are of complex construction and do not enable a sufficiently large capacity of gold, mineral or gem bearing soil to be processed per unit time.